


Groovy

by sunday_morning



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Fluff, M/M, Pre-Slash, i really just want to hug dirk, its gay kiddo's, prompt, really someone just hug dirk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-18
Updated: 2017-11-18
Packaged: 2019-02-03 19:45:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12754938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunday_morning/pseuds/sunday_morning
Summary: What happens in between scenes. AKA how Dirk found his outfit AKA Dirk LOVES dressing upWritten for the prompt "Anything with Dirk having fun going through the clothes in the evidence room while Todd-Farah-Tina-Sherlock give compliments"





	Groovy

**Author's Note:**

> written for princessparadoxical, this was seriously meant to be less than a 1000 words, but it... just kept going... and going... and here we are! I hope you enjoy!

Dirk woke with a start.

The words “project Icarus” and “experiment” swimming in his ears. His eyes opened quickly to the sight of early sunlight hitting the bars of his jail cell. Since being taken into custody by Hobbs and Tina, Dirk grew all too used to the cell, despite being constantly let out to eat and to “stretch” and attempt to solve the Cardenas mystery by breaking into a house quarantined by the us government. So really Dirk didn’t have much basis for disliking the cell, in all likelihood, he would be let out sooner than later. Dirk tried to reason with himself in a calm, reasonable, totally adult detective who makes adult decisions ways, but his mind was getting away from him. When Dirk had these kinds of nightmares, he would usually get up make a cuppa, go for a walk, solve a mystery, but now being trapped in a cell, he felt like he was back in black wing, and there was really nothing to convince himself he was free, because… he supposes, he wasn’t. 

Dirk sat up in his bed careful not to wake Todd, who was sleeping above him. He needed his sleep, he wasn’t sure was sleep-deprivation would do to him and his pararibulitus. At the thought a hot pang of guilt hit Dirk squarely though the chest, Dirk would just usually push the thing doing the guilting out of his mind, and go on with his day, but today Dirk woke up feeling drastically less Dirk than usual, he felt more like a Svlad, like an Icarus, like an experiment. 

Dirk carefully extracted his bright orange jacket Hobbs gave to him, and folded it into a square, tucking it below his head as a pillow, and trying unsuccessfully to fall asleep for a few more hours. 

Whenever Todd told him that he was obnoxious, or annoying, Dirk would laugh it off. Pssh, ADHD? Never heard of it! But now, Dirk had to agree, because his angry slew of barely connected thoughts kept him up, jumping from one idea to another. He listened to the soft background of both Farah and Todd breathing calmly while they slept. The thick starchy fabric of his Blackwing uniform pressed creases into his skin, and while this was something he got all too used to during his time in black wing, it was something he didn’t want to get used to now. He could really do for one of his old fashion colorful leather jackets right about now, the old uniform seemed to cling to his skin like it was trying to suffocate him.

Dirk didn’t know how long he stayed like that, letting his messy thoughts run amok before Tina opened the door loudly, throwing open the lights and loudly “rise and shine everybody! We’ve got a full day of… well… nothing. But now that you guys are up, do you want to hang out?” Tina shot a giddy smile to a half-awake Farah who stumbled out of her bed.

Todd slurred out a sleepy “what’s happening are we free to go?” 

“Just cause you’re prisoners doesn’t mean you have to live like caged animals” Tina said rolling her eyes 

Dirk shot up, oh good they were getting to conversation much earlier than he expected.

“Actually, the term prisoner literally means-” 

Dirk cut off Farah, finishing her sentence with a “something different than it used to. Words change meaning” Of course Farah tried to sabotage Dirk’s secret plan by being a good citizen of the country and reminding Tina to do her job as a police officer, ugh stupid Farah, and stupid Dirk for not telling stupid Farah about his stupid plan which would have made them both considerably less stupid, though he supposes it wasn’t really a plan, and there wasn’t any real way to tell her before Tina walked in. Dirk continued “Like literally which now figuratively means totally so it’s perfectly acceptable-”

Todd interrupted Dirk, because apparently that was something they were doing now “It’s too early for this” 

Dirk grabbed hold of the bars and leaned in towards Tina. “Scuse me Tina, I know this is a strange ask, but do you have any clothes I could wear?” Dirk knew if he could get out of the cell and get some new clothes, he would be back to his old self in no time 

“clothes? Sure, we got all sorts of old uniforms”

“your offering us police uniforms?” Farah asked scandalized, there she went again being a ‘prestigious us citizen and all that’ 

“old ones yeah. Plus, if you want to want to look, Hobbs has got some stuff in evidence lock up from campgrounds every year after Sound of Nothing since like the 80’s” Tina agreed

Now that sounded fancy “and by Sound of Nothing you mean?” Dirk asked getting progressively closer to Tina 

Tina joined in, putting her hands on the bars and pressing closer to Dirk “it’s a music festival!” 

“You’re telling me, you’ve got like, vintage police uniforms and old Rockstar hippy clothes, and you’re just… willing to let us wear them?” 

Tina smiled devilishly “Yup. Wanna come on out and take a look?” 

Dirk felt his heart hammer in chest, and he gave her a tilted eyebrow look, which he didn’t actually what it looked like, but he hoped got his point across, he really should inspect his different faces in a mirror before he uses them on actual living people to see which ones look cool and not. He gave her a deep “mhhmm” 

And Tina smiled delightedly “okay” with that she started running off towards evidence, expecting them to follow, except they couldn’t, because they were still locked, and the keys to make the door very much so unlocked were clipped on her belt, and the belt was running away, because it was clipped on Tina-

“Door!” he called out 

Tina gave out a brief “oh yeah!” and then unhooking them from her belt slung them across the room vaguely in their direction, barely missing Todd’s outreached arm and landing in their cell. Todd and Dirk shared a look, but Todd’s was more of annoyance, while Dirks was thinly veiled anticipation hidden by what he hoped was amusement. It didn’t take long for Todd to jimmy the door open, and as he went to unlock Farah, Dirk took his first steps out of the cell for the day, immediately feeling a heaviness lift from his chest.

If Dirk had anything to do about it, today was going to be a good day. 

Collectively Dirk, Todd, and Farah found their way to evidence lock up, which turned out to be small room separating the lobby and the cells. It was chocked full of old boxes with thick layers of dust atop it, it was evident it hadn’t been used often or in a long time. Tina was already bent over a newer looking plastic tub full of what looked blue police uniforms, looking up she offered a pair of pants to Dirk

“here, this should fitcha” 

Dirk looked down and ran the course material in his hands. Nope! No more course material, or uniform clothes! He was going to dirk-his style-up, and ‘dirk-it-up’ he meant make something better, though Todd might not agree. He knelt next to Tina, and grabbed her hands, to get her attention, she turned immediately towards him with an excited smile. 

“listen Tina, do you have anything a bit more…groovy?” he asked giving her yet another face he hadn’t rehearsed in the mirror, he really had to get on that.

Tina returned the face earnestly “let’s see what we can find!” she said with a shoulder wag that looked vaguely like dancing. 

She shoved the box aside with her foot before scavenging through the depths of the room, pulling out stained carboard boxes, and piles of clothes not even boxed. Dirk found a footstool, because of course he had, and had begun climbing it to get to the taller boxes that piqued his interest. 

Dirk reached into a box and blindly pulled out the first thing he touched, which happened to be a pair of giant rainbow baggy pants, and he called out for Tina.

He let the pant roll down and show themselves off in their natural beauty and Tina shrieked at the sight of it, her arms coming to her head to shake in excitement.  
“I love it!” 

Dirk laughed loudly as Farah and Todd rounded the corner slowly like they were still waking up, and weren’t yet ready for this closet raid this early in the morning, they came face to face with the baggy pants and, with a shared look of confusion, Todd asked 

“What’s going on?”

“weren’t you listening Todd? Tina’s lending us clothes” 

“Illegally” Farah added offhandedly

Dirk continued “and I just happened to stumble across these tubular pants, and she’s going to let me wear them!” 

“Dirk, you are not going out in those” Todd scolded, sounding much too serious for Dirk’s liking

Dirk kept rummaging through the box of 80’s clothing “and why ever not?” 

“because you are going to attract way too much attention, you’ll look like MC Hammer” 

“who?” Dirk asked, pulling a face as he pulled out a pair of leg warmers, black legging and a neon leotard. He showed them quickly to Tina who cheered at the sight, and then threw them to Farah. 

“Here you can wear these” 

Farah looked at them briefly, raising her eyebrows, and opening her mouth to make shocked faces. Finally, out came “no” that two octaves higher than her normal voice, Dirk didn’t see what was wrong with it, they would have looked kick-ass together, the bangin’ 80’s they would have called them, though Dirk isn’t entirely sure who ‘they’ are. 

Farah tossed them back, and Dirk threw them back immediately to Todd this time “here then you can wear them” 

Todd threw them back just as fast with a “no one is wearing the vintage 80’s leotard” 

Tina shot up from the back of the room “I will” 

Dirk grinned at her and gave her am excited thumbs up.

“you already have clothes, I thought the whole point of this was getting inconspicuous clothing, so we could blend in. Not look like we just walked out of the wrong era” Farah said, still not having stepped foot into the room.

Tina shrugged and gave Dirk a defeated ‘well she’s not wrong look’ 

Dirk frowned and shoved the leotard and the baggy pants back into the box of 80’s memorabilia. Before he could go any further, Tina gave a hoot, pulling out pair of knee high red leather boots and a giant white fur coat stained curiously in red.

Dirk turned to look at Todd, who visibly paled a few shades. “that cannot be the same one” he whispered 

Dirk laughed, it was a different shade of white then the one Todd wore in the Lydia Springs case, but it was a ‘blatant universe-shove’ nonetheless “c’mon please, can we make it a tradition, that one of us wears a fur coat when we solve mysteries?” 

Todd just shook his head forcefully “I’m not wearing that” 

Farah stifled a snort and turned to Todd expectedly “I’ll wear the leotard, if you do” 

Todd gave her a look. 

Dirk beamed at her openly

Tina snickered.

Farah shrugged 

It was going to be a great day. 

Seven minutes later, Dirk emerged from the room wearing the ill-fitting neon baggy pants and a brightly patterned tank top that smelled of old beer, Tina had donned a pair of star shaped sunglasses she found in a box, and Todd was sitting on a chair in the lobby pulling on the leather high heels, and talking with Farah who looked uncomfortable and incredibly bad-ass in her bright green leotard, black tights, and white leg warmers. Dirk had found a matching white sweatband and clasped it around her forehead, to complete the look. 

Tina cackled in delight at the sight of them, and Dirk hoped some kind of emergency required they all took off in whatever it was they were wearing so they didn’t have to change into normal boring clothes. 

Todd posed an eyebrow as he stared at Dirk’s self-proclaimed swaggy look, “are you happy?”

Dirk nodded “Oh very much so. Never been happier in my life in fact, happiest day of my life, very very happy!” 

Farah barely concealed her smile “can we change now?” 

Tina who had taken to lying on the floor in laughter looked up suddenly “No! Not until we get pictures!” 

She then rushed off to the evidence room to grab her phone, as Dirk looked happily between the two, he literally couldn’t be happier than he was at that moment. It was then when the door chimed out and Hobbs sauntered his way into the police department, his hat perched on his head, his hands full of items needed to de-tree Mr. Cardenas, and a donut clasped between his teeth. When he turned to see the three of them, dressed to the nines in… things. His mouth widened in surprise and the donut fell from his mouth comedically. 

Dirk beamed at him. “Hiii!” 

Tina at that moment chose to walk in sporting a new ripped jean jacket, open over a bright orange bralette that she proudly displayed, she had a matching orange sweat band wrapped around her braided hair, but placed in a way her odd braids were poking out around her head like a halo. “Look what I found in there, I thought I might join you”

“oh lordy” Hobbs said, not bothering to pick up his fallen donut “now what do we have going on here?” 

Tina smiled, unperturbed at his presence “a fashion show!!” 

Dirk looked down at her “I love that jacket” 

She smiled back “I know!” and then quieter using her hands to shield her words from Hobb’s. Kinda. “I’m thinking about keeping it” 

Farah groaned her head between he hands “also illegal. In case anyone cares” 

Hobb’s stayed frozen for a moment before shrugging, bending down to grab his donut and shoving it back in his mouth. “Okay, well don’t forget a picture now”  
Dirk positively beamed. 

After a few photo shoots, featuring an ecstatic Dirk and Tina, a disgruntled Todd and a mildly-amused-but-I-have-to-pretend-I’m-not-having-fun-because-I’m-a-professional Farah, and even a few snap shots of Hobbs laughing in the background and encouraging different poses. They all went their separate ways, changed from their swaggy vintage clothes, and into boring but better fitting police uniforms, and Dirk was left to search through the closet for something more colorful and less, baggy. 

He sat on the floor with a carefully folded uniform in front of him, the dark empty feeling threatening to overcome him. After nearly an hour of searching, all he could find that would fit him was the dark blue coarse police uniform, Tina had offered at the beginning. Looks like there would be no brightly colored leather jackets for this case, no patterned shirts or ties, no interesting textures, or fabric, just this, the grey of the black wing jumpsuit, or the dull blue of the police uniform. 

Dirk sat staring, he knew he had to move sometime, but he let his thoughts distract him from the hole in heart widening. Was it stupid to be upset over clothes? Yes, probably, but Dirk really couldn’t bring himself to care, couldn’t bring himself to stop. He felt empty, he felt much too big and much too small at the same time, but mostly, Dirk felt nothing at all. Just this big hallow space of nothing.

When he got out of black wing the first time, Dirk was distracted by everything. Butterflies, and dogs on leashes, and traffic lights, and café’s, he felt hundreds of emotions that he had felt before, but it was as if they were put under a magnifying glass, multiplied by a hundred. When he was sad he was allowed to cry, and wallow, and when he was happy he was allowed to laugh wholeheartedly, and be joined with other people’s laughter, or he would gain weird looks from people on the bus, but it didn’t matter because he was allowed to feel. He was free. 

But now, he felt like he did in black wing, cut off, choked, it somehow hurt worse because he knew what it was like to feel, to get a strong emotional reaction from nearly everything, but even the hurt was swallowed up, eaten by the black hole inside himself, and replaced with emptiness. 

Dirk closed his eyes against the onslaught of thoughts, ‘was he broken?’ and ‘would he be fixed’ and ‘was this normal’ and ‘how do I not even know what’s normal at this point?’ and blame, and so much blame. 

And then a soft voice “Dirk?” 

Dirk opened his eyes, and watched as everything went sliding back into place, he saw the ground, and the uniform, and two bright, bright blue eyes. 

“oh!” Dirk said feigning enthusiasm “hi Todd, I didn’t see you there” 

Todd was kneeling in front of him like he was approaching a wild animal. He moved awkwardly, slowly folding his legs in front of him, until he was sitting cross legged a bit to the left of the uniform in front of Dirk. “are you okay” 

Dirk wiped at his face, which was stupid, because he wasn’t even crying he didn’t think, and it made it look like he was, but he wasn’t so it was in fact stupid for him to do. “Yeah…” for once, Dirk didn’t fully know what to say. 

“you don’t seem it” Todd said slowly. 

Dirk cleared his throat. “Yes, I’m fine. I was just looking at the clothes I’m going to wear, which are fine clothes, and I like these clothes, they are in fact, great clothes, they do their job as clothes, which is in fact, just to cover, and these will do that job wonderfully. “Dirk was vaguely aware that the word clothes was beginning to sound a bit strange but he dredged on “and I’m going to go now, to put on these clothes” 

He started to move before Todd laid a tentative hand on Dirk’s to calm him. 

At the touch Dirk’s mind went completely and entirely blank. 

“Do you not want to wear the uniform?” Todd asked quietly. 

Dirk mind, somehow, found its way back to him, and he scoffed. “haven’t you been listening Todd? I just told you that these clothes are fine, they’re great-”

“-clothes” Todd finished for him “yes, I know, but you don’t want to wear them do you?” 

Dirk looked at him again, suddenly aware that his mouth had gone quite dry and that Todd’s hand was still on his, and that they were close, so very close. Dirk’s eyes darted away from Todd’s for a second, desperate to look anywhere else but at him, at his eyes… he made contact with the pile of his black wing uniform in the corner, crumpled, and lifeless, and he lost color in his face. The thought of putting that back on his body made his skin positively crawl. 

Todd followed Dirk’s eyes to the uniform, and something clicked in his mind. 

Todd cleared his throat, and stood up, using Dirk’s hand to help him up too. He nodded once determinedly “Let’s find you some clothes” 

Dirk smiled, feeling his eyes wet at the notion, and he felt utterly ridiculous about crying in an evidence room, about getting colorful clothes, but he knew it was more than that. It was that, without having to sell it out, someone understood. 

Todd dropped his hand, and started looking through the boxes “what ones haven’t you looked in yet?” Todd asked. 

Dirk shrugged “well I think we’ve looked through all of them” 

Todd nodded resolutely “then were going to have look through them again” He swung a carboard box from the shelf, and took off the lid. 

Dirk turned his back to look through another box before he heard Todd’s voice behind him. 

“uh Dirk…” when Dirk turned around, he saw Todd holding a complete outfit in front of him, a long-sleeved mash of different colors, reds and blues, all joining together in some cacophonic mess that Dirk absolutely adored. The shirt had a giant collar, that pointed out in different directions, and then plunged into a deep v-neck. Todd had a light brown pair of pants, and a darker jacket, altogether it would clash, and look much to 70’s for anyone’s liking, but Dirk absolutely adored it, and his eyes widened at the sight. 

His eyes flitted from the outfit to meet Todd’s and he smiled widely, feeling tears fill his eyes again. “I love it”

“I’m glad” Todd smiled endearingly at Dirk, and then placed them in a pile by the box “I guess the universe knew what you needed. I’ll leave you to get dressed then” 

With that Todd grabbed his own police uniform, and walked away, leaving Dirk with his thoughts. 

As Dirk tore away his baggy rainbow pants, and his shirt, and carefully pulled on the outfit, he couldn’t stop smiling, his thoughts now abuzz with different ideas about the Cardenas case, and ‘The Boy’ and Mona Wilder, and everything was a blur. 

He smiled at himself in the mirror once he was finished, shucking on his jacket and turning sideways to examine himself, he felt new, and fresh, and much more Dirk.

It was a wonder what a new outfit could do. 

“Hmm” he said to himself “Best case ever”

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr at please-hug-dirk and give me a prompt!  
> Leave a comment if you liked!! :)


End file.
